There is no habit in life that pays bigger dividends and pays them more promptly, than complete breathing. It is the source of your health, your cheerful spirits, your feeling of youth, your energy and your relaxation.
A healthy baby is the perfect instructor in breathing and relaxation. Watch it and see why. The new-born child uses all the muscles of its trunk that should be involved in the breathing process – those of the abdomen, sides and back.
In the beginning of your relaxation practice, you will observe that the expanding movement in the abdomen, as you breathe, starts above the stomach. The better you learn to relax, the lower the starting point of your breathing will be. Complete breathing, when you achieve it, will give you the sensation that your abdomen is lifted from the region between the pelvic bone and the navel. When the lift starts above the navel, it is an indication that your breathing has not yet regained its proper function.
The new Way to Relax by Karin Roon.
“Use Correct Breathing to relieve problems such as lack of sleep, headaches, asthma, back pain, jet lag and colds”
“Someone recently showed me the annual prospectus of a large spiritual organisation. When I looked through it, I was impressed by the wide choice of interesting seminars and workshops.
It reminded me of a smorgasbord, one of those Scandinavian buffets where you can take your pick from a huge variety of enticing dishes. The person asked me whether I would recommend one or two courses. ‘I don’t know’ I said, ‘they all look so interesting, but I do know this’ I added ‘be aware of your breathing as often as you are able, whenever you remember do that for one year and it will be more powerfully transformative than attending all of these courses, and its free.”
Eckhart Toll from ‘A New Earth’
“Eminent authorities have stated that one generation of correct breathers would regenerate the race and disease would be so rare as to be looked upon as a rarity”
“Seventy per cent of the waste material of the body is excreted in the out breath, only three per cent through solids, seven per cent through urine and twenty per cent in perspiration”
Scientific Research
“Chronic respiratory disease is a major cause of death and ill health in this country. Most people take shallow breaths and draw in the abdomen, two mistakes which mean that the base of the lungs is not being properly ventilated”.
Here’s Health Magazine
“In the beginning of your relaxation practice, you will observe that the expanding movement in the abdomen, as you breathe, starts above the stomach. The better you learn to relax, the lower the starting point of your breathing will be. Complete breathing, when you achieve it, will give you the sensation that your abdomen is lifted from the region between the pelvic bone and the navel. When the lift starts above the navel, it is an indication that your breathing has not yet regained its proper function.”
“It seems that this oxygenation (however attained) can also make it less likely that any rogue cancer cells in the body will survive to form a life-endangering tumour. Altered breathing practices therefore can pay somatic dividends in various ways for all of us. So it is only a small move to link our present increased interest in breathing with the malaise of spirituality of western civilisation”
Take a Deep Breath by Peter Tatham
The Guardian, 2nd Oct l987
A famous writer said “to breathe correctly i.e. how you breathe is almost as important as whether you breathe”, in the latter case it is a matter of life and death, in the former case it is nearly as important, i.e. the difference between health and disease.
“It has been effectively demonstrated that by simple attention to relearning breathing techniques phobias and panic attacks can be largely eliminated.
Pay attention to your breathing as a form of relaxation, stress reduction and healing. You may not be aware of it, but every tense situation or even memories of tense situations will cause a change in breathing. Generally the more stressed you feel, the more shallow your breathing will become.
Adult humans normally breathe at a rate of one breath every six to eight seconds, and inhale an average of sixteen thousand quarts of air each day.
People continually inhibit natural breathing in many ways.
When breathing is obstructed or suppressed, the cells of the body do not receive the full amount of oxygen necessary to carry out their assigned functions.”
Wellness by John W Travis MD.
“Eminent authorities have stated that one generation of correct breathers would regenerate the race, and disease would be so rare as to be looked upon as a curiosity. Breathing may be considered the most important of all of the functions of the body, for indeed all other functions depend upon it.”
The Science of Breath by Yogi Ramacharaka
“70% of the waste material of the body is excreted through the breath, only 3% through solids, 7% through urine and 20% in perspiration.”
Scientific Research.
“Chronic respiratory disease is a major cause of death and ill health in this country. Most people take shallow breaths ad draw in the abdomen. two mistakes which mean that the base of the lungs is not being properly ventilated.”
Cheryl Isaacson, Here’s Health Magazine August l983
“Lewis (1964) claimed a seventy percent cure rate by breathing re-education in order to reduce chronic anxiety. Some young patients require only a few weeks, seventy-five percent are completely free of all symptoms at twelve months, twenty-five percent are left with occasional mlld symptoms. Twenty percent lose their anxiety; only about one in twenty is quite intractable.”
L C Lum, Consultant Chest Physician, Papworth Hospital, Cambridge
(Chest, Heart and Stroke Journal)
“All is contained in the divine breath, like the day in the morning dew.”
Ancient proverb